Blue Goose ~ Day 277

February 28, 2015 ~ Olive Branch, MS to Blytheville, AR

It was Saturday morning as I navigated through the traffic south of Memphis and then across the Mississippi. It was sunny...Saturday in the south in sunshine...nice. Memphis would be another wonderful city to poke around in...with its music and the Great River as they call it down here. It anchors the northern reach of the lower Mississippi River as New Orleans does the southern part.

Wapanocca NWR is in northeastern Arkansas, not far from Memphis. I got there mid afternoon and found the bayous and swamps with both open water and with ice. While not a traffic jam, there were several other vehicles driving the raised roads. The slow slow drivers (less than 5 mph) are also nature lovers / birders; the others are hunters or fishermen...or women. (I am not certain if I have ever seen a lone woman in the pickups on these back roads, however. They are all  men in camouflage jackets wearing billed caps.)

Wapanocca NWR - AR

WWW.FWS.GOV

Deer Quota Hunt Information - Click HereWapanocca NWR located 20 miles northwest of Memphis, Tennessee, in Crittenden County, Arkansas was established in 1961 to provided habitat for migrating and wintering waterfowl. The refuge is located four miles west of the Mississippi River and protected from the river by the river levee. Prior to establishment of the refuge, it was the site of the Wapanocca Outing Club which was formed in 1886. This was one of the oldest and most prestigious hunting clubs. The club managed for waterfowl and most of the lake was set aside as a waterfowl sanctuary. 

Today the refuge literally stands as a wildlife oasis in an agricultural sea. An excellent diversity of habitat exists comprised on mainly agricultural land, bottomland hardwood forest, early stage reforested hardwoods, open water and flooded cypress/willow swamp. Thirty small field impoundments totaling 190 acres have been developed for waterfowl in the agricultural area. Because of its strategic location in the heart of the Mississippi Flyway and the diverse habitat, the refuge is a prime wintering area for migratory waterfowl and a major stopping place for migrating warblers. Bald eagles, great blue herons, great egrets and anhingas nest on the refuge.

Wapanocca is a typical refuge along the river, an "oasis in an agricultural sea."

I drove several miles watching pairs of Hooded Mergansers, the males so dandy and the females so drab; many Northern Shovelers, more armadillos scuttling off into the roadside weeds, the usual passerines that I've been seeing lately and hundreds of waterfowl on Lake Wapanocca, although it was hard to see them through the trees on the shore.

Northern Shoveler - Wapanocca NWR - AR

There are always the back stories, and I read of the Driver brothers who are now no longer allowed to farm on Wapanocca. Their family farm had been located on refuge property until it was "condemned" in 1966. However, the Drivers continued to farm the land under an arrangement in which they would leave 25% of their corn in the fields for Canada geese. But, the geese are not migrating south as they used to. Snow Geese are so numerous they are causing problems on their Arctic breeding grounds, and the refuge does not want to manage for their benefit. Wapanocca is now concentrating on restoring hardwood habitat and grasslands for migrating birds, including Cerulean and Prothonotary Warblers. Thus, there is no need to continue to allow the Drivers to farm on the refuge, a decision which has not gone over well with them. So it goes.....

It was peaceful. Several mergansers and ducks were sleeping on half-submerged logs, waking only if I stopped. The late afternoon light was coming through the swamp to the west.

Great Blue Heron with dinner - Wapanocca NWR - AR

I stayed in Blytheville and ate one more Mexican dinner where the food was OK but the desert delectable: vanilla ice cream blended with a shot of Kahlua, served in a small wine glass. Simple and elegant.